Last Thursday, in the first of a three-part
series of discussions organised by St Paul’s Institute and sponsored by CCLA,
an ethical fund manager, Archbishop Vincent Nichols placed before
the audience, challenging views for our society and it’s communities, to
consider what sort of City it is that we want that would better serve society. As keynote speaker for the
evening, Archbishop Vincent took a view of the City as a place where people
live and work. Since it is people who make the City, it follows that the City
can therefore be a place of human flourishing. The Archbishop’s talk therefore
was entitled ‘ Good People ’.

Quoting TS Eliot who said ‘ there is
no life that is not in community….. ’ the Archbishop offered that if one were
to take the view of a City as being a community, then we must pursue all that
cultivates community. The ancient Greeks he went on to say,
had a clear view on the purpose of the city, ‘ the polis ’ as they called it which was to
build a good societywhere citizens thrived as members of a virtuous community. In a city since we are all in it
together, the well being and fulfilment of each is in some ways dependent on
others. There are ties of trust and solidarity to be recognised and
developedbetween people and
institutions which in turn create common bonds. These common bonds and shared common interests could result in good. In recent times though, the apparent legitimisation of the pursuit of
self interest which were once believed to result in better outcomes for
all had led to breakdowns such as the financial crisis, prompting searching
questions about inequalities which have been generated by the approach of self-enrichment. Therefore more collective thought was needed about what can
be changed for the good of all. Archbishop Vincent offered as a
key to the answer, the concept of ‘Good people bound by good
purpose’.

Good first had to be defined, itself
not an easy process sincewe no longer share many of the patterns of thought which would help
establish its meaning. Instead of applying the conventional rationale of morality and duty he
felt it would help to understand ‘desire’ as a vital and fundamental driving
force of ethics and goodness. In our quest for relationships of
deep friendship and for our lives to have meaning so as to make a contribution, we
all have in us a desire for ‘good’. The Archbishop said
that respecting others and seeking their good was essential to one’s own
good. Seeking the good and responding to its attractiveness further takes us out
of narrow, self-centered attitudes. It is he suggested the path to true
human flourishing and fulfilment.

However he did recognise that our
desire for the good can easily be distorted through selfishness greed, pride or
lust. It is a struggle between
good and evil that runs in every aspect of our lives. Thus in order to lean to
the good we need tolearn to pursue virtues that become ourmoral agents.
These would help us do that which is right and honourable irrespective of
reward and regardless of what we are obliged to do. The Archbishop then briefly
explored the fundamentals of the virtues ofprudence, justice, courage and
temperance.

Prudence or right
reasoned action was the opposite of rashness and carelessness. Courage ensured firmness and the
readiness to stand by what we believe in times of difficulty while Justice enabled us to give what was due
to others by respecting their rights and fulfilling our duties towards them and
the virtue of Temperance which helps
us moderate our appetites and use of the world’s created goods was the opposite of consumerism and the
uninhibited pursuit of pleasure. These together form essentials of a happy life.

The formation of good people startsin the family
which isthe first school of citizenship. Loving, stable families are the
vital building block of every society. Schools come next and are
important in building character, as are universities and in the context of the
City, the business schools. Whilst we should look to theseinstitutions
of the community to foster virtue and thereby build
character, we should also look to the institutions of commerce to nurture and
strengthen character. Such institutions should have a clear sense of purpose so as tobe
enterprises of ‘good purpose’.

When sight of purpose is lost then
breakdowns of the system occur. Reflecting on the Francis Review into
Staffordshire NHS Trust, Archbishop Vincent quoted the head of the professional
standards authority who spoke of leaders having lost sight of their moral
purpose. They seemed to have forgotten
they exist to do good.Concern for finances had taken priority over care, compassion and
respect leading him to say that “unless you know the purpose for which you are running an
organisation you will never get the ethics right within it”.

That sense of ‘good purpose’ was not
just for the public sector but also for commercial organisations. Mark Carney,
the incoming Governor of the Bank of England spoke of the speaking of
the need for companies to “define clearly the purpose of their
organisations and promote a culture of ethical business”, and, in doing
so, for employees to have “a sense of broader purpose, grounded in strong
connections to their clients and their communities”. It is not simply a focus on profit as
an end in itself but Archbishop Vincent suggested that the true justification
of business was when profit was made while making the world a
better place. Goods and services produced that
truly serve people, create employment, offer fair returns
to investors, while minimising harm. Any business looking to remain true
to that purpose neededpeople with technical skills and competencies as well as the
required character and virtues he outlined earlier. These “ architects of lasting business
success ”in staying true to their virtues would create a
culture within their organisations that actually promotes and strengthens good
practice.

It should be noted that the
exploration of ‘good people bound by good purpose’ comes up against the limits of law and
regulation since these mechanisms are slow to react and new rules usually deal with
the last problem not the next one. Furthermore a compliance
mentality creates perverse incentives while increasing bureaucracy. Rules
become a lazy proxy for morality and people think that if what they do is not
against a rule, it must be in order. Such a society he counselled, would become inherently
fragile. What is required the Archbishop believed was a fundamental transformation of
purpose, so that business, and the financial sector is seen by everyone as it
should be - at the service of society. Reform though must be credible
or as John Kay, an economic commentator says, it will take another financial
crisis before the City really wakes up to the scale of reform that is needed.

Archbishop Vincent though is firm
in his belief that there is great potential for good in people which far too
many employers do not release or encourage because of the primary aim to
maximise short term profit. In mitigation, companies tended to justify
themselves through additional programmes of social benefit or philanthropy but as the Archbishop insisted, these acts of benevolence should be
supplementary to the shared value created by the core work of the business
activity. Rather than react to laws and guidelines or engage in these programs, it was far more important for business to have a clear purpose to serve society. To this end, the quality of leadership is critical since all the good influences that support the way for a
better society is hugely influenced by these choices made by leaders. The
Archbishop drew on Paul Polman’s remarks asCEO of Unilever when hereminded the assembled guests at the launch
conference of the Blueprint for Better Business last September that in the long
term no business can succeed in a society that fails.

The Christian instinct Archbishop Vincent affirmed, sees the potential for good in a city and gave us all food for thought in
noting that the Bible started in a garden and ended in a city. He then drew
our attention to the setting of the evening’s lecture that the beauty that is
St Paul’s Cathedral invited those of us present to gaze upwards and place our
hopes and fears in the context of the Eternal. It also perhaps afforded us recognition
of our frailty, our need of one another and our shared destiny. In
closing, Archbishop Vincent left us with his impression that humanity had
a most extraordinary capacity for good and that hedeeply
believed that there are many untapped
ways by which we could organise the world of work in service of the common
good.There then followed a discussion with the panel consisting of Baroness Helena Kennedy, Tracey McDermott of the FSA, Peter Selby who is the director of St Paul's Institute. Proceedings were under the chair and direction of Stephanie Flanders, the economics editor of the BBC. Questions were put to Archbishop Vincent from both the panel and audience. Archbishop Vincent's responses in the video are well worth noting.

.....….. is Divine
Mercy Sunday, a solemnity of the Roman Catholic Church celebrated on the Sunday
after Easter. The choice of this particular Sunday is not by coincidence considering the first
mass during which the image of the Divine Mercy was first displayed was indeed on the occasion of the first Sunday after Easter. Instead it was through a vision received by Sister Maria Faustina Kowalska to whom the image first appeared that Christ Jesus Himself it was, who required the image of the Divine Mercy to be blessed on the Sunday after Easter.

Divine Mercy Image at Westminster Cathedral

Early Life and Calling

Born on August
25 1905 into a family of ten and named Helenka Kowalska, Faustina was the third
child of Stanislaus, a carpenter and Marianna Kowalska. While attending an
Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament at the age of 7, she wrote that she felt a
calling to religious life and wanted to enter the convent after finishing
school. Unable to obtain parental permission to follow her calling, she went to
work as a housekeeper in Lodz to support herself and her parents. A year passed
and despite asking her parents again and on two occasions, she received firm
refusals to enter a convent.

At aged 19,
Faustina whie attending a dance in a park in Lodz with her sister, Faustina
stated that during the course of a dance she had a vision of a suffering
Jesus. Rushing away to a church, she reported that she was told by Jesus to leave for Warsaw
immediately and join a convent. So she packed a small bag that night and without telling her parents nor knowing
anyone in Warsaw, took a train bound for the city the following morning.

Convent, illness and the first vision

While at
Warsaw she was referred by a priest at St James’s church in Grójecka Street to some accommodation whilst making her
approaches to several convents. Faustina was finally accepted by the convent of
the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy on the provision that she would pay for her
habit. In 1925 she worked for a year as a housemaid, making deposits from her
savings until she finally received her habit in 1926 when she took the name ‘
Maria Faustina ’ of the Blessed Sacrament. Faustina was Polish for ‘ fortunate
or blessed ’. Two years later in April 1928, Maria Faustina took her first vows
as a nun at a ceremony attended by her parents.

Faustina
was sent to a convent in Vilnius
initially for a year as a cook before being transferred to a convent in Plock
in Poland. It was at Plock that Faustina first showed signs of an illness,
believed to be tuberculosis which would lead to her demise nearly a decade
later. It was also at Plock that Faustina first saw the image of Christ that
would lead to her writings on the Divine Mercy.

In
1931, one night while in her room in Plock, dressed in a white garment with
rays of white and red light emanating from near his heart, Jesus appeared to
Faustina as the ‘ King of Divine Mercy ’. In her diary ( Notebook 1, items 47
and 48 ), Faustina wriote that Jesus told her to paint an image in accordance
with the vision before her with the signature ‘ Jesus, I trust in You ’. Jesus
also told Faustina how He desired the image to be venerated.Paint an image according to the pattern you see, with the signature: 'Jesus, I trust in You '. I desire that this image be venerated, first in your chapel, and then throughout the world. I promise that the soul that will venerate this image will not perishFaustina also noted in her diary that
Jesus had also told her that he wanted the image of the Divine Mercy to be
solemnly blessed on the first Sunday after Easter and that Sunday should be
called the Feast of Mercy. Unable to paint nor finding assistance in doing so,
it was not until three years later that the first artistic rendering of the
image would be made under Faustina’s direction.

Further visions, writings and historical notes

Late
in May of 1933, Faustina would again be transferred to Vilnius as a gardener.
It was here that she met Father Michael Sopocko, who after making his own
investigations, would support her in advising her to maintain a record of all
her conversations with and messages from Jesus. It was Fr Sopocko too who
introduced Faustina to the artist who would, under her direction, produce the
first image of the Divine Mercy, the only painting of the image Faustina herself
ever saw. It in 1934 that Faustina recorded a prediction that her message of
the Divine Mercy would be suppressed for some time and appear to be ‘ utterly
undone ’ before it would gain acceptance again. Item 378 in Faustina’s Notebook
1 bore this interesting inscription

There will come a time when this work, which God
is demanding so very much, will be as though utterly undone. And then God will
act with great power, which will give evidence of its authenticity. It will be
a new splendour for the Church, although it has been dormant in it from long
ago.

In
September 1935, the year of the first mass of the Divine Mercy, Faustina wrote
of a vision about the Chaplet of Divine Mercy in her diary. In the chaplet
which was about a third of the length of the Rosary, Faustina wrote that the
purpose for the prayers of mercy contained in the chaplet was threefold – to
obtain mercy, to trust in Christ’s mercy and to show mercy to others.

By
November of that same year, Faustina had written the rules for a new
contemplative congregation devoted to Divine Mercy and a month later visited a
house in Vilnius which she had seen in a
vision as the first convent for the congregation. However she was reminded by
Archbishop Jalbrzykowski that she was perpetually vowed to her current order

Faustina’s
long time supporter Fr Sopocko wrote the first brochure on the Divine Mercy
devotion in the summer of 1936. It carried the image of the Divine Mercy on the
cover and Faustina was in receipt of this as her illness took hold. She was
moved to Pradnik in Krakow where she would spend most of the final two years of her
life in prayer while writing her diaries.
In March of the following year, Faustina wrote of a vision that the
feast of Divine Mercy would be celebrated in her local chapel in the presence
of large crowds and that the same celebration would be held in Rome before the
Pope. In July, the first holy cards with the Divine Mercy image were produced
and Faustina began at the suggestion of Fr Sopocko to write the instructions for
the novena of Divine Mercy which she had reported as a message from Jesus on
Good Friday. Throughout the year, much progress was made in promoting the
messages of Divine Mercy and a pamphlet with the image of Divine Mercy was published with the title Christ, King of
Mercy. In it were the chaplet. Novena and the litany of Divine Mercy.

The passing, beatification and canonisation of Sister Faustina

In
April 1938, Faustina’s illness had worsened and she was sent to a sanatorium in
Pradnik. However by June she was no longer able to write and Fr Sopocko who
visited her wrote of her condition but noted her ecstasy when in prayer. Later
in September, Faustina was taken back home to Krakow where she would remain
until passing away in October after making her final confession, 13 years after
entering the convent. She was buried on October 7 and now rests at the Basilica
of Divine Mercy in Krakow.

Before
her death, Sr Faustina predicted a terrible war and asked for prayers for
Poland. When her prediction of war came true, Archbishop Jalbrzykowski allowed
public access to the Divine Mercy image and the size of the crowds attending
lef to the Divine Mercy devotion which was a strength and inspiration for many
especially during the difficult times of the war. By 1941 the devotion had
spread to America where millions of copies of Divine Mercy prayer cards were
distributed there and wordwide. Whilst in hiding during the war Fr Sopocko wrote the constitution for the
congregation and assisted with the formation of the Congregation of the Sisters
of the Divine Mercy. Within 13 years for Faustina’s passing, 150 Divine Mercy
centers had already been established in Poland alone. However in 1959
Faustina’s writings were placed on the Index of Forbidden Books and remained
there until the index was abolished in 1966 by Pope Paul VI. It had been reported
that the initial ban stemmed from theological issues so in 1965 Karol Wojtyla,
then Archbishop of Krakow launched a new investigation while submitting a
number of documents about Faustina to the Vatican, requesting that the process of her beatification should begin.

In
1977, over a year before being elected as John Paul II, Archbishop Wojtyla
asked the Vatican to review and lift the ban on the Divine Mercy devotion to
successful effect the following year. Thus in April 1978 the Prefect of
the Sacred Congregation of the Doctrine of faith declared that the notification ban was no longer binding, and
stated that misunderstandings were created by a faulty Italian translation of Faustina’s
Diary which were compounded by difficulties in communication during World War
II and the subsequent Communist era.

The formal beatification of Faustina involved the case of
Maureen Digan, a visitor from the United States to the tomb of Sister Faustina.
While praying at the tomb Miss Digan a sufferer from Lymphedema (a disease which causes significant
swelling due to fluid retention) for decades and who had undergone 10
operations including a leg amputation without success reported that while
praying at Faustina's tomb, she heard a voice saying ‘ Ask for my help and I
will help you ’ This she did and her constant pain stopped. 2 days later Maureen Digan
reported that her shoe became too large for her because her body stopped undue
liquid retention. Her recovery was investigated by numerous physicians who stated
that she was healed but were unable to provide any explanation for the
occurrence. The case was declared miraculous by the Vatican in 1992 based on
the additional testimony of over twenty witnesses about her prior condition.

Sister Maria Faustina was beatified on April 18, 1993 and canonized
on April 30, 2000 as the first saint in the 21st century. That her Vatican biography directly quotes some of her
conversations with Jesus distinguishes Saint Faustina from the many other reported
visions. At a modest estimate made in
2010, the following of the Divine Mercy devotion was believed to be over one
hundred million Catholics.

It would not have escaped our notice that Saint Faustina's writings about the need to obtain, trust and dispense mercy mirrors very closely the words our Saviour gave us in that as we ask for mercy ourselves so should we show it to others. Thus it is very appropriate therefore that as Christ Jesus Himself intended, this special feast should follow the passion and celebrations of Holy Week when we recall the sacrifice of our Lord and rejoice in His resurrection and saving grace, when indeed our reflections should encourage us to turn those words into deeds.

A big welcome to my chill-out zone, where I talk about my enjoyment of photography, my thoughts and discoveries, my loves and view of life as I embark on my new career. I had been taking pictures for fun since my days at school. My idea of fun is people and the stories they tell. So most of my pictures are about people. It's my way of telling a story. The story about the people whose pictures I take, what they do and latterly, pictures of their pets too, which is also great fun.